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tv   Weekends With Alex Witt  MSNBC  November 18, 2012 9:00am-11:00am PST

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developing now, president obama overseas at this hour making his first public statement on the conflict in the middle east supporting israel's right to defend its country. >> there's no country on earth that would tolerate missiles raining down on its citizens from outside its borders. >> meanwhile, heated exchanges from both sides of the aisle on the fallout from the benghazi terror attack and what krorm former cia director general p at a capital hearing. we begin with president obama in southeast asia at this hour. the president began his three-nation tour in thailand at a news conference with the thai prime minister, he defended israel's right to defend itself but expressed concern over a ground war. >> we are fully supportive of israel's right to defend itself from missiles landing on
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people's homes and work places and potentially killing civilians. we will continue to support israel's right to defend itself. >> chief white house correspondent chuck todd is traveling with the president. good sunday to you. what else do we hear from the president on israel and otherwise? >> a couple of things on israel, he made a plea to allies of the palestinians in particular. the president of egypt, the prime minister of turkey said if you would like to see a two-state solution in the near future, a palestinian state next to israel this has to deescalate now. the president expressing this fear if hamas doesn't stop rocket attacks on to israel's soille he fears left unsaid is israel may retaliate and turn in to a ground war and then the idea of a two-state solution in the peace process will be in the way distant future.
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obviously the middle east peace process has been on hold for quite sometime. he was asked about this trip will include a visit to myanmar which is also known as burma. he was asked whether it was too soon. a lot of human rights violations taken in burma and he wouldn't have gone if aung san suu kyi didn't think it was right for him to go. a few notes to point out. one is during -- before the press conference he and secretary clinton were visiting a mondastermonastery. they were joking about getting prayers over the fiscal cliff. the president at the press conference was asked what about what kind of prayer he asked for. take a listen. >> i always believe in prayer. i believe in prayer when i go to church, back home. and if a buddhist monk is wishing me well, i'm going to
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take whatever good vibes he can give me to try to deal with some challenges back home. i'm confident we can get our fiscal situation dealt. >> a little bit of -- you could tell he has a lot on his mind during this trip, between israel, gaza, the fiscal cliff negotiations which pick up right after thanksgiving and oh, by the way, he is here to do two historical firsts, first time a u.s. president will visit cambodia an myanmar. >> i have been thinking of the multiple ways as he has to focus on so many things at once but he is doing it. thank you so much. the fifth day in the middle east crisis and a potential tipping point. they are waiting for a potential cease fire or ground invasion. the striels flared today. one rocket toward tel aviv. hamas rocketed and struck a home
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in the town. and strikes from the land, sea and sky. the latest attack killed at least 12 civilians and a bomb struck two media buildings in gaza. they struck a refugee camp. medical officials say three children were killed. netanyahu says israel is preparing for a quote significant expansion of the operation. ban ki moon is preparing for a trip to egypt as discussions are underway for a truce. delegations will arrive in gaza on tuesday. let's get to the scene on the ground. stephanie is live in tel aviv. i understand some sirens were just going off where you are. what have you heard? what would that indicate? >> reporter: this is the second time today we have heard sirens in tel aviv. two rockets were launched in the capital city and when they were launched the iron dome, that is israeli's protective missile
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system they have in place that was launched, as well and they intercepted both rockets. that's what happened earlier in the day. this is something that people in this city are beginning to get used to five days in to this conflict. >> what about the status of the cease-fire negotiations? what do you know about that, stephanie. >> we know they are ongoing. israeli radio is saying an envoy was sent to cairo today. that person will meet up with envoys from the palestinian side, as well as representatives from qatar and egypt that will work on negotiating a cease fire. today you had prime minister netanyahu say as long as the rockets are landing in israel there will be no cease fire. his defense minister ehud barak said he expects the possibility of this conflict widening. that's a suggestion there could be some ground invasion in gaza at the very least. as you know, there are troops amassing in in the south of
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israel preparing for that ground invasion. although so far it seems like talks are ongoing ander in a period of trying to figure out if they can maintain a cease fire so the troops don't have to go in. >> it is a tense time is an under statement there. how long will these talks go underway? do you know? is there an outside that israel has indicated they will allow for them to try to negotiate and bargain before they may do military action? >> well, we did hear from the foreign minister in israel who said they are open to all possibility cease fire options. so they certainly, at least, are giving indications they are willing to talk. you have an incident today in gaza, an attack from israel that levelled a residential building killing at least 12 people. that's a deadly, deadly attack and will certainly inflame tensions on the ground and in
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gaza and there's concern some rocket taeng attacks coming to israel could be more deadly. anything could push it over the tipping point. >> thank you. let's go to front page politics now. new, explosive reaction following david petraeus' closed door testimony to the house and intelligence committees. this on the benghazi attack. >> do you believe the president or anybody serving the president deliberately misled the american people about the true nature of this attack for political reasons? >> no. >> absolutely not, senator. >> that's correct. this whole process is going to be checked out. we are going to find out who made changes in the original statement until we do, i really think it's unwarranted to make accusations. >> why would you choose someone who had nothing to do with benghazi to tell us about benghazi? that's kind of odd. why pick on her. she didn't know anything about benghazi. she was the most political
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person they could find. i don't know what she knew but i know the story she told is misleading. i don't know why it was misleading but let me put this in context. would this white house mislead the american people about national security events? i think they might because when the bin laden raid occurred they leaked every detail about the raid. >> joining me for more is the political writer for the "new york times" john har wood and "washington post" amy gardner. thank you for being here. appreciate that. you heard senator graham essentially accusing the administration of misleading on the nature of the benghazi attack. what's your attack? >> my attack take is that benghazi has become the channel through which republicans remaining unhappiness about the election outcome is being focused. look, it was catastrophic tragedy. but we have an explanation from
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petraeus for why susan rice said what she said. that is to say they deliberately obscured what they knew in order to avoid giving away too much to our adversaries. now you could say why did you need to do that? i'm not competent to say what advantage was gained there, but i'm not sure in the alternative what advantage anyone thinks the obama administration was going to get by misleading. the event happened. did anyone think the obama administration was trying to preserve some illusion that terrorists never would hit us as long as obama was president? we have been at war with terrorists 11 years and lost thousands of lives. i don't understand the point that graham is making, and the idea to question why did you put susan rice on the talk shows? administrations make decisions every week about who they will put out to repeat talking points. it doesn't really make much sense to me to be honest. >> to that end, then, amy, you have senator graham, other
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republicans, john mccain for one, they are calling for a special prosecutor. john harwood brings up these questions, but does it ego to the level of needing a special prosecutor? how far do you think this will go? >> clearly there is a movement on the republican side to keep this going. as we heard senators graham and mccain want a special investigation. we have representative mike enentire, the chairman of the house intelligence committee saying they altered the talking points to talk about this event after the fact. but on the other hand we have sax by sham bliss and joe lieberman says we don't need the special investigation. it is too soon to say how far it will go. there is clearly an element in the republican party that wants to keep it going but uncertain how it will be received and whether people want to pursue this. >> speaking of uncertainty, john, did general petraeus clear up the fog surrounding the attack on the consulate in
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benghazi when he testified? >> there remains uncertainty about what the mix of factors was that produced this attack. i think not having been in the briefing i don't know how much he cleared that up. he certainly seemed to try to take some of the heat off of susan rice. i think you can see from both what dianne feinstein said today, what carl levin said, the way that president obama treated the issue at his news conference, he's making the point you want to go after somebody on benghazi go after me and i think that's where republicans will end up and see to what extent they want to drag it out. i'm not sure the administration would mind, for example, if susan rice were to be nominated by the president for secretary of state i'm not sure they would mind that fight. the president might embrace and challenge republicans to oppose her. >> during the campaign, the republicans you could argue lost pursuing this line on benghazi.
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how far do you think republicans will take this? and will it be perceived as a political attack? >> that's right. people may have already forgotten, the election seems like a long way in the past for some of us, but mitt romney tried to make an issue of benghazi in the hours after the attack. he jumped on the administration before we knew that four americans had been killed and that obviously backfired on him. because the information was still coming out about what happened and how deep the tragedy was. and then in the foreign policy debate, the second debate he tried to make benghazi an issue by claiming that the president hadn't called it a terrorist attack when he had used the word in his rose garden press availability on the issue. that, too, backfired. it's interesting, too, in the days following that he stopped -- mitt romney stopped talking about it. i think that is a reflection of the fact that it was an issue that wasn't working for him. and that might be a cautionary
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tale for the republicans who are pursuing this today. >> i think he stopped talking about it after the debate when he was called out on it. john, we have the president in thailand today asked about reaching a deal to avoid the fiscal cliff. here's what he said about that. >> i'm confident that we can get our fiscal situation dealt. it's important to recognize that, yeah, democracy is a little messier than alternative systems of government. but that's because democracy allows everyone to have a voice. >> you know, to both of you actually the president is looking at a draft of this deal after the thanksgiving break. how realistic is that john and then amy? >> i'm not sure how quickly after thanksgiving there will be a deal but leaders were talking in an couraging way about getting a framework agreement before christmas and the end of
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the year that would outline where the congress will fill in the details on tax increases and entitlement cuts. i think given the spirit, post election that we have seen, at least initially that the prospects are fairly promising. although we have proven very well how messy our democracy is over the last couple of years and how difficult it will be to get the leaders to get their caucuses to rally behind them. >> done deal post-thanksgiving, amy or closer to christmas? >> how encouraging the meeting at the white house should be and should be read is a subject of debate. another way to look at it is it would have been discouraging had there not been a measure of good ds will expressed after their meeting on friday morning. as john said, there are still huge gaps in terms of where they stand and what they are focusing on, the president has made clear he wants to focus on tax rates
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for the wealthy. the republicans have made clear that is not an issue they are interested in talking about. >> more to come. many thanks. >> in west coast headlines the debate over what to do with campaign war chests after a candidate lose. in our list of number ones, i one airport you must hear about. keep it here with "weekends with alex witt." into their work,
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some headlines on the west coast. a front page story about the president's address ya visit. in the article, analysts say it
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is a chance to boost business and build on the president's legacy and another title election's over, cash remains. what they must do with leftover campaign money and seattle times, return of the red fish how sock eye are rebounding but the effort comes at a cost to the public of $9,000 per fish. new accusations from the house intelligence committee. on "meet the press" mike rogers made a controversial statement over who knew what president about the petraeus scandal. >> do you think the president should have been told before election day. >> i'm not sure the president wasn't told before election day. the department of justice didn't notify the president. >> that's news. the president knew before election day. >> i didn't say. that i i don't know. >> there is no evidence of that. there is no evidence.
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>> joining me is associated press correspondent kimberly dozier who covers intelligence and special operations. welcome back to the show. good to see you. >> good to be here. >> any reason to believe what that chairman rogers is on to something that the president knew about the affair before the election? >> that was a question asked by intelligence committee members this week. when he did know? the white house says he was informed the thursday after the elections and they said they couldn't let them know the investigation was going on as water of watergate procedures put in place to make sure the people at the highest levels could not interfere with an cia investigation. >> what would with it matter? >> it would matter in terms of that was a member of the obama administration that was being investigated and that was kept from the public during the election. that is what some of the republican members of congress
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are asking right now. everything in our reporting has indicated that the white house informed the president on thursday and he accepted david petraeus' resignation on friday. we'll keep asking. >> i want to get your reaction to friday's benghazi hearing. was the we question of who knew what when answered there? >> it took a lot of questioning of the different lawmakers. everyone depending which party they were part of seemed to hear a different thing. what i was able to get down to is petraeus told them that yes the talking points the cia went sent up in to the interagency process to determine what comes out the other side did include mention of al qaeda splinter groups suspected to be part of the attack but the final talking points referred to them as extremists. some of the reasons that petraeus said those points were changed, he thought, was because they didn't want to let these al
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qaeda groups know the intelligence community was on to them and they didn't want to prejudice a future investigation by putting out a public statement saying that basically the u.s. government had decide who was responsibility. >> any concerns the investigation in to who was responsibilityable for killing the four americans has been sidelined by the debates over the administration's public response? absolutely. i did hear that complaint from people in the hearings. they said the debate kept moving back to -- and i have to stress, petraeus was not under oath, he was briefing legislators on friday, voluntarily on what he discovered from his own investigations two weeks ago in libya. what he was telling them is, he was trying to tell them the course of events on the ground as he discovered them. the debate on friday turned to, yes, but what did you know and how did you describe it and who changed those talking points? petraeus said he wasn't exactly
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sure. >> okay. i want to ask you about the media's reassessment, if you will, now of david piskuetraeus. an article how i was drawn in to the cult of david petraeus and then a phony hero for a phony war. as i am looking at these i'm skrim bling with an ouch. they say he created a myth of himself as hero general and his accomplishments, iraq iraq and afghanistan are possibly failures. what do you think of the media reassessment and is it fair? >> i think when you look at petraeus' reactions when he realized this affair was going to become public and his decision to resigns reflects the man we have covered, many of us in war zones have covered for years. that he lived by certain principle answer when he
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realized it was going to be puck lick that he hadn't lived up to these principles he felt he had to take this action. it's been tough for all of us to watch this unfold. many of us in the reporting community, in d.c., know paula broadwell and covered general petraeus in the field. from my point of view, i'm trying to stick to the facts. tell me what the cia investigation in to general petraeus reveals as to whether or not he misused resources. tell me what is the fbi's conclusion about the documents, the chas fied documents that broad broadwell allegedly had on her computer. what is going to happen with general allen, the war chief, he had 20 thousand pages back and forth with jill kelley, the social it that paula broadwell was e-mailing and only five were
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of a questionable nature. you have all of these facts swirling and lives and reputations in the balance being judged. i want to get down to the bottom of the facts. it's not my job to judge these people. >> okay. kimberly dozier, many thanks. great conversation. appreciate it. >> thank you. has technology reduced the violence in the middle east? we will look at the iron dome defense system coming up.
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that often means long lines and waits at airports. according to orbitz, the airport expected to be busiest, chicago o'hare, l.a.x. second, followed by san francisco international, new york's la guardia and boston logan international. talking turkey, the state that produces the most birds is minnesota. they supply a third more than north carolina and arkansas. it was not the first but the macy's thanksgiving day parade is the biggest and the charlie brown float has made the most appearances. chuck has been in six parades since '68. >> it's the great pumpkin. he's rising out of the pumpkin patch. >> no, it is snoopy, linus. while we have yet to find the great pumpkin we found the most gourds are produced in illinois. and what is america's favorite pie forring thissing in?
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and best-in-class passenger roominess? yeah, that would be cool. introducing the all-new nissan pathfinder. it's our most innovative pathfinder ever. nissan. innovation that excites. ♪ welcome back to weekends with alex witt. israel is expanding its military assault on hamas forces inside of gaza. both sides exchanged bombs and rocket fire for a fifth straight day. today israel's missile defense system intercepted another one. and another landed in an apartment building if the southern part of the country. israeli forces bombed two media centers in gaza as well as a refugee camp. let's get perspective on the crisis. joining me is the former state
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department spokesman p.j. raleigh. are president obama's words strong enough in his defense of israel? >> absolutely. as he said in his remarks, no country should have to tolerate a barrage of missiles that put its entire population or a substantial percentage of its population at risk. israel has a right to respond. that said, obviously, how it responds and how it is viewed in this region, a fragile rv region given the events the last couple of years is very important. israel has some difficult calculations to make going forward. >> how about in terms of how chose we are to a middle east war, and if that happens what are the chances of u.s. involvement? how might that play out? >> that's the risk. we have a growing gaza crisis, a civil war in syria next door, unquiet along the israeli/egyptian border,
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substantial unrest in jordan. any flare-up in one of these, has potential to spread across to the other. most importantly, you have a fragile, you know, political systems. you have countries in transition. the populations and politics are more populous. much more unpredictable environment with the event occurring here as we saw it in 2008. >> okay. p.j., tell me about this iron dome defense system. what that is about and the upgraded hamas weaponry. where does this weaponry come from? mouth how does all of the technology change the equip there? >> hamas upgraded missile systems, undoubtedly support for a variety of countries. particularly iran. because of the political changes here, egypt has relaxed its enforcement of the border between gaza and egypt making
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smuggling of these systems in to gaza more easy. then of course i will you have a little bit of the -- the building of an ingij nous missile capability in gaza since sit israel retreated in 2007. the iron dome is a major project of cooperation between israel and the united states. it undercuts one of the major arguments in the campaign that there was a lack of attention to israel's defense needs when in fact there is a great manifestation of significant security cooperation and obviously what we are seeing is it with was not a perfect system. but it has been an effective system in mitigating this missile threat to the israeli population. >> a couple of things here, though. can't qatar supplying a lot of weaponry to hamas right now? if so, how does that play in to the way we have a relationship
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with qatar? it is considered one of our allies? >> i think qatar is more involved in political support and financial support to hamas. iran has been a primary arms exporter throughout the region and has been building its relationship with hamas over the past several years. it has tried to extend its political influence throughout the middle east. >> egypt gets billions of dollars from the united states. what is the u.s. getting in return relative our to our national security? >> this is a great test for revised relationship between the united states and egypt. perhaps a relationship of cultivation of a relationship between president obama and president morrisss president /*. on the one hand the muslim
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brotherhood from which president morsi came and has an affinity with hamas. that gives egypt leverage to work with hamas to obtain a cease fire or prevent this crisis from escalating further. for president morsi, he has very difficult politics to manage. much more populous, arab street that has sympathy for the palestinians but morsi knows as egypt advances to recover economically from the arab spring he needs outside support and political and economic support from the united states. >> do you think that morsi may be saying one thing to the united states and something else in gaza, but if he does it is sort of a necessary evil, something he has to do -- you say it is a sensitive place he is. >> i don't think it is evil at all. as morsi looks at egypt's long-term interest it is not enhanced by having an open,
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growing conflict along the border. egypt has had ambassadors and is working toward a cease fire as is turkey and other leaders in the region. will they get a cease fire here? a disengagement and try to pick up the pieces in the after math. >> p.j. crowley great to talk to you. >> former new york governor pataki, we talked about the stars in the republican party and whether he may run for office again. skied if the gif the gop is on the wrong side of raising taxes? >> i don't think so. i think the american people understand that it is small business that creates jobs. that you have to reward hard work, tasking risks, and you have to reward success.
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those same polls which show that an overwhelming majority of the american people think that government is too big and think that spending cuts are appropriate more so than tax increases. getting back to bowles simpson. there was a solution. governor romney offered a solution that wasn't played up in the campaign but to have a flat dollar amount of deductions people could take. >> what about conservatives like bill crystal who are saying it is not going to kill the country if the president raises taxes on millionaires? >> i think it is the wrong thing to do. is it going to kill the country? no, we're the united states. with we survived the last four years of bad government and we will survive another four years of bad government and we will survive if you do it. it will hurt economic growth and
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government revenues. both parties have an amassive gulf between the people and washington because they see everything in political terms and in terms whofz going 0 vote for them or what interest group will support them opposed to what is right is american and the politicians are telling the people this is bad, that's bad and not what the solutions are. to me, a classic example of thaf is bowles simpson. you had that bipartisan group lay out a very intelligent, serious plan to deal with the deficit and get our economy going again. both parties ignored it. not because it didn't make sense or was right for the american people but they saw it in political, ideological terms in to how will this improve the lives of of the average americans. the people of merge are better than that. the republican party has a lot
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of great young, tremendous talent. one is not mentioned who i have always admired from afar is j n kasich from ohio. he is one out there like ted cruise and mark coe arubio. >> what are you going to campaign for. >> advance ideas and help people who share those ideas and have the ability to govern successfully. >> being a little evasive. i see something here going on. >> i learned. >> this is the beginning of something. >> i'm here at a great law firm and they treat me well and i love what i'm doing with them but i have always been a public policy person. i don't miss the trappings of office or the title but i miss the ability to be out there advancing in a meaningful way
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things that i think are right for the country and i will try to continue to do that. >> we know if you do that you have to have the support of your family. >> i have four spectacular kids. they have all done incredibly well. i'm proud of them all and they all tolerated me spending so much of my time doing politics. it's an enormous strain on your family and i think you hit it on the head. you don't do it yourself, you have to have a wife, kids, family, employers, because i haven't inherited wealth where they are tolerant and understand what with you are doing is important enough for them to say, okay, we're willing to make a sacrifice, as well. next weekend, we have a very entertaining thanksgiving edition of the best of office politics. pushing back against shopping on thanksgiving? we will tell you about one store that won't be open for business. i'm done!
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it's a new book "time" magazine describes as nearly criminally funny and we will be careful with this segment because it is called, what are we calling it, shoddy mom. >> we can all read it right. there shoddy mom, the parenting guide for the rest of us. it should be on everyone's christmas and hanukkah list not because these fabulous authors are my friends as well as the producers of "the today show" segment, fabulous segments an the authors of this book. it is a riot. it starts with the title. how did you get away with it? >> we got you. we are offended by the graphic here, bad moms because that we're not. we're not bad or fingerpointing moms or mean moms. we are giving moms a chance to talk about these moments they have every day and how to feel better about them. >> as i am reading through these moments, we all have them. they are so common. talk about some of that that you
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think we all share in non. >> we have so many titles in the book to respond to so many people but how to sleep until 9:00 a.m. on the weekends, why organized sports are great for your kids but they for you. >> i love how you say have your kids trained so when they come in too early to have them go to daddy's side of the bed. >> that works. >> i own up to that. >> one is called someone stole your baby name. how many of us can identify with that? seriously. >> you have to decide whether you want to be their friend after they have stolen your baby name. >> it gives us license with humor to look at what we want to do, those of us trying to do everything and understand we are all trying to do the same thing and get by the best we can. >> the bar is set way too high as far as parenting is concerned. we were not raised that way. our parents weren't perfect and
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yet we are expected to be. so it is just letting go of the expectation and all of the minutiae that gets in the way. let's focus on our kids. let's not do everything a as amazingly as it should be done the and just enjoy it. >> what i love most is you do it with humor. there were four of you that pit together. you two do tv and you hired a comedian to help with this. >> a writer for conan and a single mom brought hers. so we compiled our ideas together and she brought out the funny. which has been the thing that women are loving. the message is give yourself a break. too much mommy guilt. let go of that instead of crying about it, laugh about it. >> have you been caught saying the real title of the book? >> we say it -- it's true. our kids love to say my mom's a
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you know what mom. it is great. >> we are like can you run that by "new york times" best selling author. it sounds better. >> ask for the book with the title that you can't say on tv and they will know what it is right there. we are calling it shoddy mom. >> nice to meet you guys. i have gotten two copies for friends already. new debate on then benghazi talking.s. why republicans are so dogged about it. we will get to that after a break. ♪ [ male announcer ] a european-inspired suspension, but not from germany. ♪ a powerful, fuel-efficient engine, but it's not from japan. ♪
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we have a transcript of that meeting on that day. and petraeus very clearly said that it was a terrorist attack. >> why was it being a terrorist attack taken out of the public talking points. >> that's something we are going to find out but it was. that's the point. now with the allegation the white house changed those talking points, that is false.
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>> that was senate intelligence chair dianne feinstein on "meet the press" arguing the white house was not behind the changes to the much debated benghazi talking point. joining me is retired admiral and the national communications director for rick santorum's campaign. you heard from senator feinstein. even if it wasn't the white house, which made those changes, it came from high enough up the campaign of demand it came to susan rice's desk. why does that change anything? >> i think the congress is right. it should look in to what occurred with benghazi. i think you can in the navy i learn learned inspect what you suspect. with regard to the piece of
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information there were terrorists involved in this attack i think we should find out. the accountability to the public is needed. the most important issue is what the accountability review board set up by mrs. clinton is trying to find out i on the ambassador? why was the security not provided that was can requested for? four men died. this is what this is about. unfortunately too many walk washington turn it in to politics but that's what we have to get to the bottom of so we don't lose more men and women overseas. >> what about the republicans. do you think they have been misguided in their attacks now that it is clear she was reporting the facts as she knew them? >> if that is the case then fine. . the president said don't go after her. we know how this works as
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communications people. we have to contact the shows and say this is who we want to put forth. if that is true as the president alleges she had nothing to do with benghazi, what was she doing as a spokesperson for the incident where was secretary clinton and the president on this thing? and the fact the white house is saying they didn't alter these, fine. if you want to believe that, that's fine but petraeus said what he said under oath and the white house hasn't said anything under oath and the president and mrs. clinton stood over the coffins of four dead americans and claimed it to be a video and the president did it in front of the u.n. the fact of the matter is they did change the talking points, video ya his own speech after this horrific murder of our four americans. >> why would the fact it was a terrorist attack be redacted? why would that be classified information when it was immediately apparent that it was? >> i don't know.
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i wish i didn't have to say that because there was an eyewitness account the 24 hours that said there was an organizationer organized jihadist in the crowd. i learned when i was working in intelligence and the navy's anti-terrorism unit rarely do you find a one-armed intelligence officer. they are always saying on whaund but on the other hand and as the paper left the cia, that general petraeus said or allegedly now in a classified hearing that there were organized terrorists involved in the attack and why it was changed, it is too easy to leap to where it was changed in the white house to maybe there were other types of information that maybe had good reason why it was changed and that's why you have an investigation before you leap to an asrgs it was done for political reasons i want to find out because the public is due an answer and i don't want to have
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happen again that we have four men that die over there in the future. >> he is absolutely right. i'm not trying to leap to that assertion. i don't know why they would have changed it. i'm just saying for them to say they didn't change it and then go on a tour it about it was a video for the next several weeks that is in essence it is not a change. it may be to wonderful reasons but we need to get to the bottom of it to explain to the parent and the spouses of four dead americans of what happened. >> do you think the republicans have been on the wrong side of this in terms of going down the line of attack? you will note after mitt romney made the comments, and then during the first debate when he got called out on that point and he stopped talking about it. do you think the republicans need to take their cue from that? >> no, i don't. he got called out on it but it
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turns out candy crowley was incorrect and had to say she was incorrect on the topic as well. mitt romney we know he has a little problem with delivery and talking about a message in a way that needs to be sold to the american people and to get the american people on his side. i don't want to say because he was unable to pursue the it was bad to pursue. the republicans need to be careful. i don't know that we want to go down the road of cover-up or impeachment talks talk about why and how it happened but don't go down this radical road off the bat. >> i'm not sure i have heard about impeachment but we will leave it at that. >> nooet i don't want to start that. >> neither do i. president obama making his first public statements about the conflict in the middle east. a live report up next.
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good day, everyone. welcome to weekends with alex witt. a little past 1:00 in the east. we will get to what is happening as we have developing and rising tensions in the middle east as president obama visited asia. israel dropped bombs as the ground war increases. in thailand president obama commented on the confrontation. the president said israel has the right to defend itself. >> israel has ever right to expect that it does not have missiles fired in to its territory. if that can be accomplished without a ramping up of military activity in gaza, that's preferable. >> we will have more on the middle east and a live report from tel aviv in a few i minutes. explosive reaction on the probe in to the attacks on benghazi with both sides arguing over who's to blame for what some
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characterize as a catastrophic intelligence failure or cover-up. >> you believe the president or anyone serving the president deliberately mislead the american public about the attack for political reasons. >> absolutely not. >> that's correct. >> i blame the president more than anybody else. susan rice is a player here. was he informed of the june attack on our consulate where they blew a hole 40 people could go through? was he aware of the august 15th cable where he was steve s said we can't stand a coordinated attack. i blame the president for making this a death trap. i blame the president for not having assets available to help these people for eight hours. we need a select committee not only to look at intelligence failures but how could the department of defense not help these poor people over eight hours. >> mike, you heard senator graham there. what's the administration's reaction to this? >> a lot of strong views. it is an issue that is not going
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away, especially after david petraeus, the former director of the cia testified in a closed door hearing on friday. senators, congressmen from both sides of the aisle came out. little doubt general petraeus thought almost immediately after the september 11th attacks that it resulted in the deaths of ambassador stevens and three other americans that it was terrorists involved here and it was not a spahn teenagerous event. and of course most notely a narrative was put forward by susan rice some five days after the attacks on "meet the press" and elsewhere. you heard lindsey graham talk about it. there have been other intelligence members talking about it today. the question becomes, david petraeus and the intelligence committee thought it was a terrorist attack. by the time susan rice got her talking points her unclassified
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talking points to go on "meet the press" something changed. who changed it and why? both the white house and dianne feinstein insisted there was only one thing changed by the white house and that's a very minor change, changing the terminology from consulate referring to the facility in benghazi to something else. they said it was not formally a consulate. now the other question, did the intel fail or did the state department security fail that resulted in the deaths of those americans? and that's something that john mccain talked about this morning. >> this is very, very serious and it has even larger implications than the deaths of four americans. it goes to the heart of this footprint policy that this administration has been pursuing. all of the failures throughout the middle east that are -- the chickens are now coming home to roost. >> i respectfully separate from my two amigos on this one and agree with saxby. this is a tragedy but doesn't
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rise to the level of 9/11, 2001. if our colleagues think within we are done we haven't done a good enough job let them think of a special committee. >> that is joe lieberman leaving congress and the senate. he is referring to john mccain and lindsey graham as the two amigos who called for this watergate style-select committee. an idea shot down by harry reid. >> thank you for that. coming up in 20 minutes from now i will speak to a member of the house intelligence committee that questioned general petraeus, adam schiff. > thank you for being here. >> we heard from senators graham and mccain on the bnz benz attack. do the republicans have any credence on this? >> certainly they have credence in terms of asking questions.
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it's odd to say one senator graham said this morning on tv that i blame the president. i blame the president for all of these things and then say we need an impartial rong investigation. it doesn't sound impartial if you have made up your mind about who is culpable. >> do you think it is going to go as far as a special prosecutor? how far will this go? >> we are hearing resistance to 0 the idea. the amazing thing is how personal the accusations have gotten that we are hearing senator mccain and senator graham raise against the president and in turn how passionate the president was when he took on some of these accusations at his news conference last week, in particular in calling out ambassador susan rice on this issue. the president saying don't go after her. if you have a problem with how
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this with was handled come after me. they responded by doing just that. we have seen a further escalation in all of this. it is hard to know where it ends. general petraeus came to talk on friday behind closed doors to the intelligence committees. that only seems to have raised new questions about why information regarding al qaeda and terrorist attacks did not make it to the final public version of the talking points. what is interesting on nbc news.com we have an article, benghazi hearing turns ugly, republicans accuse democrats of lying. it sounds like boys in a schoolyard having that kind of fight. some of the language is ridiculous, but with regard to what is happening with this. republicans, do you think, steve, that they have lost already on this issue? why is it they keep pushing back on this? >> i'm not sure i agree they have lost on the issue. i'm not sure how much it was
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litigated in the campaign. as you noted a few minutes ago some of it was dropped after the third debate and wasn't brought up much in the campaign. as the president has said again in his press conference last week, it's still under. there's a lot of questions. i'm not sure it was settled by the election, at all. clearly, the republicans, particularly these 3ub cans, lindsey graham and john mccain are impassioned about this, particularly about the president's role and the role of the government. >> the general petraeus testified last week on benghazi. did he clear up the confusion? >> no. i think he only raised more questions. he cleared it up to the extent of saying the cia did know it was a terrorist attack. knew that early on and the question is why that didn't make it to the final talking points. somebody took it out. the white house is saying it wasn't them. so who did weigh in on the question. i would agree with steve's point. i think from a republican's
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point of view this was not litigated effectively during the campaign. that mitt romney tried to bring it up in a second debate and he lost his point on a technicality and never went back to it. we thought he would bring it up in a third debate, the foreign policy debate there would be more discussion and he would have refined his attack on the president. instead he dropped it entirely. from the point of view from his colleagues, he really didn't press the president he way he should have on this point during the campaign. >> i want to get to mention of the fiscal cliff issue. we have new comments from nancy pelosi on the fiscal cliff today. let's listen to that. >> would you accept a deal that does not include tax rate increases for the wealthy. we have seen a possible compromise that would leave rates the same but cap deductions for top earners? >> no.
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the president made it clear there are not enough -- what you described is a formula and a blueprint for hampering our future. >> what do you think? does this mean a deal will not get done? >> i think there is desire on both sides to get a deal done. that doesn't mean we will see one. both sides are taken the election to mean that the american people want action. the president has taken it to mean the american people endorsed his so-called balanced approach to balancing the budget. and we saw spirited koopg with the leaders coming out after the meetening a now they mr. get down to the details where to make cuts and revenue increases and can do you do it by just closing loopholes, is that enough or do you have to talk about tax rates in particular think tax rating for the wealthy. that's is where it will be more
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complicated. >> any chance we will have a deal after thanksgiving break as requested by the president? >> no. >> that's the quick answer. be more like christmas. >> that's a no right there. thank you. coming up a health care reform surprise in states that fought obama care. you are watching weekends with alex witt. [ male announcer ] this is sheldon, whose long dy setting up the news starts with arthritis pain and a choice.
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back to the latest in the middle east with pressure on israel and hamas to deescalate the violence before full out war begins. hamas fired rockets toward tel
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aviv. israel intercepted them. an earlier hamas rocket hit a home. ban ki moon will arrive for talks on a cease fire. arab league delegation is set to arrive in gaza on tuesday. let's go to israel. we have a live report from tel aviv. when did you last hear the warning sirens? has it been quite since the one we heard with you an hour ago? >> it was a little over an hour ago and the second time the city heard the sirens. two were fired from gaza heading to tel aviv and they were intercepted by israel's iron dome missile defense system. this is a system the israeli defense forces have been using with great success over the last five days. they say they have shot down or intercepted a third of the rockets that have been lobbied from gaza toward israel. today was no exception.
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we saw that in the night sky here in tel aviv. >> okay. any update on the cease fire talks that you can report, stephanie? >> at the moment, we know they are underway in cairo. egypt is leading them and you have representatives from the palestinians side and israeli side as well as -- actually palestinian supported qatarry enjoy and egyptian officials. at the moment no cease fire evident today. back and forth exchanges of attacks all day on the ground. the worst you mentioned before in gaza. the deadliest attack to date on a residential building. at least 12 people killed many from the same family. >> stephanie gosk, thank you for the update. joining me is former u.s. ambassador mark ginsburg who served as white house deputy adviser for middle east policy. i want to talk about a couple of
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things. israeli forces struck a refugee camp in gaza today. officials say three children died. israel has struck media buildings and wiped out a certain level of communications. israel says they are doing surgical strikes. are they working? and are these surgical strikes? they are surgical strikes be i the collateral damage of humanitarian casualties is inevitable in the tightly packed area. the people that launched the missiles, the leadership of hamas are no different than al-assad in syria. they are prepared to score political points against israel at the cost of causing civilian casualties and enormous destruction and humanitarian suffering by their own people. that's the danger of launching terrorist rockets against israel and not expecting israel to
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retaliate is absurd. >> in your recent article you wrote hamas' missile attacks on civilians demands a kitchen sink response. what are you suggesting? >> because i have come to the regrettable conclusion, as much as i support the creation of a palestinian state that hamas is a cancer in the middle east and needs to be eradicated. why? because if the missiles right now are being able to be intercepted and just imagine the low-cal ber missile they are right now, what happens when iran transfers a potential nuclear device to hamas and it fires in to tel aviv, maybe in a year or two from now? the real danger is hamas is not prepared to recognize israel's right to exist and they have become more a puppet of the iranian regime. look at where the missiles are coming from. from iran. if hamas continues to act the
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way it does against israel there's no alternative but for israel to eradicate the leadership of hamas once and for all. >> regarding iran, did this hamas have a greater objective? are they deflecting attention from the nuclear program and gaining arab support by their actions? >> they have a calculated ulterior motive to under mine the palestinian authority that was about to go to the united nations to seek once again a legal status in the general assembly and to show bullets are the only way, not negotiations. secondly, they are trying to force egyptians to make a choice between supporting a camp david peace treaty between israel and egypt or supporting hamas and i think you are right, iran wants to deflect attention away from the nuclear program and use hamas to stir up as much trouble in the middle east as possible that may, in effect cause
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greater sympathy for the palestinians an the arabs and less sympathy for israel and the united states. >> so what are the chances of the cease fire that is trying to be brokered in egypt of taking place or holding? >> well, the cease fire between hamas and israel is an oxymoron. ever since the 2008 gaza/israeli war with where you know there was enormous destruction and humane tan yar suffering there's always been these rockets. this rockets have only escalated and cross border attacks. a feast cease fire will not hold as long as hamas controls the gaza strip. >> should think u.s. stop funding egypt? would that make a difference? >> i'm in the in favor of that. i believe there needs to be more conditionality on the assistance. after all, we are providing over $3.5 billion in both military
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assistance and economic assistance, and the egyptians are desperately in need of that type of assistance, as well as multilateral aid, as well. this a real test as p.j. crowley said earlier for the morsi government to determine whether it will abide by the muslim brotherhood of hamas or be a responsibility party for tranquility and peace in the middle east. it is a difficult test for mr. morsi. remember, the muslim brotherhood created hamas in the first place. >> can i ask you one more question, regarding qatar's role in all of this. while while iran may be supplying the arms to hamas, they brought $4 million to hamas to buy that. what does that say with our policy? they are all allies of ours. >> it raises questions. the a i mere of qatar paid the first state official visit to
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gaza and forked over $450 million by which hamas was able to transfer the money to iran to buy missiles. the fact of the matter is qatar is playing a dangerous game with hamas. they see themselves as the great new power player for islamist politics in the middle east and the united states has got to be a little wiser than welcoming an amir to the united states when he is funding a terrorist organization that the united states condemns as a major state sponsor of terror. >> sensitive times for sure. former u.s. ambassador marc ginsberg. why are political opponents of health care making it happen?
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scratching your head. republican governors who were the biggest opponents of the law have decided to let the federal government run their state exchanges. >> in the end, if it is state name only we'd rather have the federal government government do it as much as it pains us living in federalism in the end. it is better they do it and not incur the additional cost to taxpayers that a state-run exchange would expose us to. >> joining me is a health care correspondent from national journal and this seems counterintuitive. why would republican governors who oppose this now allow the federal government to have more control in their states? >> i think to some degree it is a form of protest against the law. they want have their state make as many choices as possibility but in this case i think a lot of the governors hate the health reform law and want to fight it all the way. >> do you think the governor walker is correct, are state-run exchanges in name only. >> i think it is an
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exaggeration. the health reform law sets up a lot of rules about what has to happen in the exchanges and what kind of insurance can be offered there but states get to make important choices about how the marks will run and states that let the federal government do that will give us choices to customize their mark to local conditions and preferences. >> what do you think is going through the minds of the governors. health and human services secretary has had to extend the deadline twice now. what's going on in their minds? >> i think they have been waiting. the health reform law looked like it might get overturned by the supreme court. so a lot of governors said there is no point in if the law is overturned or maybe the president won't be re-elected and why plan for exchanges we don't want to do if the law will go away. i think now that the president has been re-elected, it is clear the law will go in to effect we are seeing re-evaluation by
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governors. >> how does that change things? how does it change the way my life or your life or our viewers' lives will be affected if it is run by the federal government versus the state? >> i think on a consumer level you may not notice huge differences but decisions the states can make. like will the states allow any insurer that wants to come to the market sole on the exchange where you can buy and be a lot of choices or do screening and say we want to exert more quality control, only a few plans and when you shop you have fewer choices but more standardized. >> whab the difference in price state to state. would there be variables that way? >> there will be some but a lot of baseline requirements. it will not be a huge variety. >> after the election, speaker boehner sate said the fight is over and it is i now the law of the land. do these refusals mean the fight may not be over? >> i think the federal
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government is prepared to run exchanges in the states that don't cooperate. speaker boehner is right, the congress will no longer talk about repealing the law. i think if congress we will see pb cans raising portions of the law they think are controversial or may be able to attract democratic votes and peel back smaller pieces of the health reform law. >> what's your best guess that the the states will adhere to the deadline. mid december ito make their attentions known. >> i think it is important to note the health reform law, people have to select plans beginning in ok of next year and the plans go live in the year following. there's not a lot of time between now and then. states want to run their state exchanges we will know by december which ones are ready and which aren't. ahead, getting to the truth about ben benz. a house member who grilled general petraeus on captiol hill joins us in just a moment. yeah, sure you can. great. where's your gift?
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welcome back. in new interviews today, dianne feinstein and saxby chambliss gave different descriptions of what they learned in friday's benghazi hearing. >> why was a reference to a terrorist attack taken out of public talking points? that's something we will find out but it was. that's the point. now with the allegation the whitehouse changed those talking points, that's false. >> everybody there was asked, do you know who made these changes, and nobody knew. the only entity that reviewed the talking points that was not there was the white house. >> joining me is adam schiff a member of the intelligence committee that was part of the hearings. he has first-hand intelligence on this. both were in the same hearing but have different perceptions on what happened.
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what were you nold the house's hearing? >> what we were told in the house is essentially the agencies produced the best initial assess they could give us at the time and the assessment proved to be wrong but in the initial assess they believed there was a protest at the facility and we found out there wasn't. it is clear and general petraeus is strong on this point. even though the unclassified talking points were mod fighting as they went through the process there was no white house meddling, no politicization of the process. the changes made were made to protect classified sources of information. so to go after those who use those talking points and what the intelligence community said was their best estimate that could be given publicly without compromising sources is really unjustified. >> someone changing the talking points, if it wasn't from the white house, who did it? who would have access ito it?
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>> it was circulated among several intelligence agencies. each in a process like this would add in the word smithing of the document to make sure it was accurate and didn't disclose so much information that it would tip off our classified sources or methods. that's what they said was done when the general was asked especially was the final product something you signed off on. it was clear yes it was. the general said he thought initially it was terrorism and i think all of us recognized from the get go when you are firing mortars and rpgs at an american facility that is terrorism but the more important question is who'sable and how do we bring them to justice? and those questions -- we're losing focus on frankly as we get in to political bickering about what the unclassified talking points were. i think we should focus on
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bringing those to justice that are responsible. >> i think people would agree with you but i that begs the question why put susan rice in front of a camera and have her imply it was a spontaneous uprising. the truth may have been classified but does it mean you should float alternate theories. >> as the general made clear a thet time susan rice went on the sunday talk shows their best assessment is it did begin as a spontaneous protest. there were militants and extremists who were implicated and involved but it began as a protest. that assessment we now know is false but at the time that's what general petraeus believed and that's what they told members of congress we should be saying to the public. obviously that's what they were sharing with the ambassador as well. how do you fault someone using the best assessment? i think if the ambassador had gone out on talk shows and
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departed from what the intelligence community told her was her best sense she would have been open to criticism. why ignore what the intelligence community was telling her. to do otherwise would have opened her up to legitimate criticism. >> i'm interesting in how political the hearings were, was there a partisan tone. >> it seems to be a test for the members of the committee. they heard different things from the same testimony. from my point of view, when general petraeus says this was their best assessment at the time reflected in the talking points, then it says the me that reliance on that by members of congress and the ambassador was justified. it was clear from his testimony there was no evidence whatsoever of any white house interference, politicalization of this. but some still cling to that theory. all evidence to the contrary may
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i ask if the hearing answered questions of what an ambassador was doing in that area of the world, that level of war zone really, little protection and at a sensitive cia facility? >> well, you know, i think the two with days of testimony we had shed a lot of light on the chronology of what took place minute by minute, hour by hour. it was a multimedia presentation and some of the most revealing were some of the video footage shared with us. in terms of the ambassador's itinerary and why the ambassador chose to be in benghazi then, he was a courageous diplomate who was very close to the libyan people, understood the security situation there and the hazards, but like many diplomates was willing to risk his life for a cause he truly believed in. there are remaining, legitimate important questions for us to answer about the adequacy or inned a kweisi of the security
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situation there and i'm confident the pickerington commission will get to the bottom of th the bottom of that. this was a brave ambassador who understand the risks of his job and was willing to under take them. >> representative schiff from california, thank you for your time. >> thank you. the big three with reaction to an unexpected twist on one issue today and a lot of reaction from you to stores opening on thanksgiving. one place is bucking the trend. we will tell you why. into their work, their name on the door, and their heart into their community. small business saturday is a day to show our support. a day to shop at stores owned by our friends and neighbors. and do our part for the businesses that do so much for us. on november 24th,
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♪ oa wit takes some doing.sn't just happen. some coordinating. and a trip to the one place with the new ideas that help us pull it all together. from the things that hang and shine... ...to the things that sparkle and jingle. all while saving the things that go in our wallet. more saving. more doing. that's the power of the home depot. create a musical light show with the maestro mouse voice- activated ornament. it will be w-- next week wi of the biggest for retailers. a lot of them are opening on thanksgiving but nordstrom will be closed allowing workers to celebrate with families. we have been asking you, do you think stores should open on
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thanksgiving day? here's some of your tweets. one says keep the holidays sacred. >> no it is so stressful cleaning, cooking, company i can't think of shopping. another writes i like the old-fashioned way, closed on sundays and holidays. and mark adds, yes if the stores open on thanksgiving day it will stop some from over eating. that's funny. keep sending your tweets to me @alex witt and i will get to more many the future. battle over benghazi, say what and this week's must reads. political reporter for the "washington post" felicia -- and former congressman martin frost democrat from texas. hello. thank you for being here. >> good to be with you. congressman frost, listen to graham on "meet the press"
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talking about ambassador rice. >> why would you choose someone who had nothing to do with benghazi to tell us about benghazi? that's odd. president said why pick on her. she didn't know anything about benghazi. she was the most politically compliant person they could find. i know the story she told was misleading. i don't know why but let me put it in context. would this white house mislead the american people about national security events? i think they might simply because when the bin laden raid occurred they leaked every detail about the raid. >> you were in congress for a while. can you figure out if there is politics going on here? what's your sense or are there legitimate questions? >> i think there are people trying to attack susan rice and disqualify her to be the next secretary of state. she ought to be judged on the merits separate and apart from anything that happened here. she would be good secretary of
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state in the state in the future or wouldn't. i agree with senator lieberman. let the congressional hear committees hear about this and decide whether you want to have a super committee deal wit. we have to get the fact and assume ambassador rice was doing what she was instructed to do. no one suggested he wasn't using the talking points given to her. the question remains what was going on behind the scenes. those are legitimate questions. look at that and everybody should calm down for a minute. >> the white house is effectively portrayed the questions in the past about benghazi as being political. should the gop drop the line of attack? because if for no other reason the white house said there were national security concerns here. >> i agree with the congressman. we need to let the facts dictate the line of questioning and keep in mind that the congress has a right to ask tough questions.
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the congress is an equal branch to the executive branch and that is their role to ask tough questions to get to the bottom of thing. unfortunately we have had white houses in the past on the republican and democratic side to lie. the facts need to come out here and if there is some foreign intelligence, sensitive information we need to be cogny sabt sant of that. -- kon cognizant of that. >> how long do you think this will last on captiol hill? >> as things tend to do on the hill until the deadline is approaching. especially when it comes to this benghazi debacle. there's two ironies here. the first is susan rice, if there were any reason why her potential nomination to be secretary of state will be imperilled this wouk the last reason is she was too closely to talking points provided to her. she is accomplished but has been known in the past to butt heads
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with people up and down the chain. so if she were to be disqualified that would be the reason to see it come down to her and a party of talking points is unexpected. on a second point on congress's role here, when it came to the issue of whether or not or what role the u.s. should play in libya, the house did hold four votes and each time had conflicting messages to the point that senator lieberman made today there is a commission outside of congress to look at this. it is not clear how they would accomplish anything except further politicizing this. >> listen to congressman mike rogers. he dropped a bombshell on "meet the press." >> should the president have been told before election day? >> the attorney general said the
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department of justice did not notify the president. but we don't know if the -- >> that's news. the president knew say that i s don't know. >> there's no evidence of that. >> there's no evidence. >> the attorney general knew months before this. there was no formal notice to both congress or the intelligence community. i find it, we just have to ask the question. >> robot, are you comfortable with him asking that question that way? i mean it's not necessarily based on evidence that we know of. >> no, i'm not comfortable with that. it sounds like he went out on a limb a little bit and then quickly tried to dial back. he could have more information than the general public. let alone me. so i don't know that. but i got the sense that he went out there and kind of dialled it back a little bit. that's all i know. >> any surprises from you, representative frost. the head of the intelligence committee would come out with such a direct accusation? >> mike rodgers is a very decent guy, a former fbi agent. very much into all of this.
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i think he just kind of went off on a tangent. the white house has said, the president has said that he didn't know before the election. i don't think anybody should be accusing the president of the united states of lying. >> felicia we heard on "meet the press," that there's clear and necessary separation between the justice department and the white house. is it your sense that this is strictly political? that congressman rodgers is just suggesting some sort of a breach there? >> well the first thing that this brings to mind when it comes to his accusation here is back to during the campaign season when harry reid was accusing governor romney of not having paid taxes for ten years. just sort of throwing this statement out there without anything to back it up. it's not too hard to see how this is, is along the same lines as that. and unless he is able to bring forth some kind of evidence there, it's just another baseless claim it seems. >> okay. up next, the big three with their must-reads and one must-see.
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we're back with the big three and time for your
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must-reads, my panel today, we'll go ladies first, here's yours, felicia. >> my must-read is from the "washington post." the four-star general. i would say it's stories like this actually give us a deep dive into some of the spending that happens among these four-star general. so you've got officers like petraeus and others who have got gourmet chefs who have had free housing paid for and a whole bunch of other perks that come along with the office and at a time when there's a whole lot of debate on capitol hill about things like military spending and this defense sequester that's coming up at the evidence end of the year. this article gives a little more nuance into that debate and raises the question about whether the military spending is as sacrosanct as the public
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believes. >> robert, what's your must-read? >> the front page of the politico today, alex has a phenomenal story about the 2016 presidential election. >> get out, be quiet. >> senator marco rubio talking about immigration. talking about lower taxes and for those of you out there who thought that the presidential election ended the day after election day -- you're wrong. >> okay. representative frost. we'll finish with you, what's your must-see? >> my wife and i went to see the new lincoln movie yesterday. i would recommend people see that. it makes everything that's going on right now seem like a little petty and a little minor when you put it in perspective. if you have to read something, do some light reading, read john grish om's new book, get a break here. get away from politics for a while. >> we appreciate that advice. >> from all of you here thank you very much. have a good one, guys.
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that is a wrap of this sunday edition of "weekends with alex witt." i will see you on thanksgiving morning. join me for a budge of news before you start your thanksgiving meal, have a good one. try running four. fortunately we've got ink. try running four. it gives us 5x the rewards on our internet, phone charges and cable, plus at office supply stores. rewards we put right back into our business. this is the only thing we've ever wanted to do and ink helps us do it. make your mark with ink from chase. [ male announcer ] you've reached the age where you don't back down from a challenge. this is the age of knowing how to make things happen. so, why let erectile dysfunction get in your way? talk to your doctor about viagra. 20 million men already have. ask your doctor if your heart is healthy enough for sex.
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